I'll Save Myself
by Hermione Weasley
Summary: Sister story to"Don't want your hand this time". Not a sequal, can be a stand alone. A short ficlet about OOTP from Harry's POV.


A/N: This is a variation on a theme of the ficlet I did about Remus called "Don't want your hand this time". Both songs are stolen from the lyrics of Evanescence, which, that's right, I don't own just like Harry Potter and all the characters, plots etc therein.  
  
Hope you enjoy.  
  
I don't mind flames though.  
  
~  
  
I can still see it. His face, his eyes, the look of shock with a hint of dying laughter etched upon my godfather's face. I reach out. I try to save him. But each time my fingers fall on air, on nothingness, on the void that should be the happy form of Sirius.  
  
Sometimes I can fool myself into thinking that he is still alive. I close my eyes and hear his bark-like laugh echoing in my head. I can see the eyes full of laughter, yet still haunted by Azkaban. I can feel the bear hug he gave me when I left from the winter holidays. That was the last time I saw him before ... before the Department of Mysteries.  
  
Guilt. It seems to be floating around me like a fog, blocking my eyes from the world around me. Choking me, so I wake up in the middle of the night gasping for air. It settles in my stomach, a cold hard stone leaving little space for food and drink. Every mouthful I take seems to be marinated in it, causing my appetite vanish before I have even swallowed.  
  
I've passed this guilt around more times and to more people than I care to think about. I indulged the Headmaster and let it be his fault for a while. The old man had kept it from me, kept yet another secret from me. Only this secret, unlike the others, had killed someone. But of course it was 'for my own good'. Thank you, but I think I'll be looking after myself from now on.  
  
Hermione (along with Ron, Ginny and the others, when I fancied it) proved to be a nice candidate as well. She should have stopped me, should have presented me with more reasons why it could be a trap. She should have stood up to me like a Gryffendor.  
  
Snape proved to be the most fun as my natural hatred of him was always eager for more wood to kindle the blaze. The only problem was, however, that when I got control of myself and looked at the facts, he really had really done the least. He had provoked Sirius, of course and I let myself gnaw at that for a while. That died quickly, however, and I saw that he had done more to aid me and the rest than hinder us. He had told the Order what had happened at where we were... this thought gave me a strange sort of triumph for a whole five minutes. If he hadn't said anything, if he hadn't gone to them, Sirius would never have come. But that one had more holes in it than Swiss cheese. There was nothing that I could really pin on him, and that is what made me hate him even more. How dare he be innocent of this crime?  
I tried to squeeze many people into the place of "Fault for Sirius's Death", but in the end there was only one person besides Bellatrix Lestrange that would fit: me. When I finally realized this it ate me up and tore at my insides so much I thought I would surely die. But time has passed, and I've accepted it. No, the pain is anything but gone it is merely that it has kind of become a part of me, a dull yet omnipresent ache.  
  
I've been the good little boy, though, replying as cheerfully to their letters as I can without suspicion. But their letters in themselves have been nightmare. Before I even open them I can feel the pity that is soaked into the parchment. I've all but stopped reading them. Even if I was at deaths door and Voldemort himself had made a camp outside Private Drive, I doubt that I would say anything besides the usual "everything's fine here".  
  
I don't need another savior.  
  
I've taken it upon myself to finish the task I should have completed long before the Department of Mysteries. Although it is too late now to prevent Sirius's death, I have some weak satisfaction in practicing it. As if by mastering it and prevent similar situations to happen might redeem me. I wish.  
  
Mrs. Weasley, Hermione and the rest of them were going to be a nightmare. All of them looking at me with pity, as if I was some puppy that had been left at their doorstep. Dumbledore would no doubt, be keeping more secrets from me. Tell me, Headmaster, what other foundations to my life have you been hiding from me? How much of a lie am I living? Hagrid or Dobby-sized?  
  
I'm being watched, I know this. I've seen them. At least, I've seen bits of cloak disappear behind trees and heard the familiar pop of someone apparating. No doubt they'll try to give me a shadow during Term as well. I won't let them. No more spying on me. No more saving Harry. I'm not your son, Mrs. Weasley. I'm not weak, Professor Snape. I'm not eleven, Dumbledore.  
  
From now on, I'll save myself, thanks.  
  
A/N: Hope you enjoy, I'm thinking of doing other's if this is well received (perhaps Snape . what did you really think I could resist him? Maybe Peter, Bellatrix, Neville? Any suggestions are welcome. 


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